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After two weeks my 'chart' told
me I was spending 38-59 minutes on the morning routine. I began to keep
a log to explain the longer days with entries like 'mispairing in #5 and
#6' (discovering I had placed two males together and two hens together,
a situation which took twenty minutes to unravel). Another day I had to
stop dispensing food to cut long nails on three hens, something I should
have caught in pairing up. One morning I came down to find two pairs had
escaped because of faulty door latches, I had meant to fix these cages
the previous year, and so on. Other days claimed my time to wash perches
hit and miss, reline vandalized nests with coffee filters, etc., another
opportunity for streamlining by using more assembly line techniques.
Once you have some data in hand to
explain the overlong days, ask yourself what you could be doing
differently on the short days.
1. Is your routine too
complicated? In your noble desire to coddle, are you serving redundant
foods, (two vegetables at the morning meal which are virtually identical
in nutrition.) Why not give them twice as much of the one they really
like?
2. Analyze your body movements in
cage servicing. Any unnecessary motions? How many times do you cross the
room, go looking for a missing or scarce item? What is your basic style?
Are you methodically going at it one cage at a time, papers, drinkers,
eggfood, seeds and treats as well as nesting material, before you move on
or do you move between cages, doing all papers, then all seedcups, all
nesting material, all egg gathering in rounds? In my own case, because of
the antiquated and mismatched condition of my cages, I prefer to tackle
one cage at a time, but do only papers, seed and water , before moving to
the next. Then each gets the 'blue plate special,' a small saucer which
holds layers of greens, orange or carrot as well as eggfood or egg. The
nest-lining material is handed out at the very end to those building. This
gives me time to eyeball each cage three times, enabling me to sense
trouble brewing, if any. With pure assembly line technique I might miss
that a certain pair is not getting along (two of the same sex
inadvertently paired?), that the hen is plucking the male or chicks, or
that a chick in a large nest is falling behind in development and needs to
be watched or moved.
So what is the 'Blue Plate
Special' which cuts my labor time by thirty per cent? It is a little
dish holding anything other than seed and water, usually three items.
These dishes (they don't have to be blue) are laid out assembly line
fashion on the rolling cart I use to carry all bird supplies up and down
the cage row. Mine are fifteen peanut butter lids laid out at once, first
a leaf of endive, spinach or kale, a nickel-sized piece of orange, and a
one-eighth wedge of boiled egg for building or laying hens. Incubating
hens get no egg until the projected morning of hatching, when they also
get a dab of eggfood.
Feeding pairs get as much
eggfood as they will likely eat before 4:00 p.m., when they get fresh
eggfood as well as more greens, corn cake or corn and so on. Blue plates
are washed daily as are drinkers for cages with chicks to avoid bacterial
contamination My blue plates shaved fifteen minutes off my routine the
first week I used it, more as time went by. It keeps me from going crazy
in the market season when I leave for work at 5:00 a.m., and I save even
more time by cleaning all cages right before lights go out, doing only
water, seed and nesting material. Before dawn, only the aid of a night
light, I the little blue plate specials go into the cages. These are
assembled upstairs in the kitchen as I make my departure coffee. My
eggfood is frozen, of course and thaws quickly as the sun comes up. The
'blue plate' generally lasts until about four, when I return to replenish
their foods.
3. Now I am going to be a hypocrite
and suggest that if your cages are a mishmash of hand-me-downs in all
sizes and shapes, you should consider the benefits of uniformity. Spend
some money! Or why not build some of your own so they require the same
drinkers, papers and perches? The next time you go digging for a
certain elusive perch, think how much easier it would be if every
perch fit every cage! Be sure to order triple sets for every cage
so you can change perches without stopping to wash perches twice in a
week. Better yet, four sets! This will quiet your nerves considerably. But
before you make cages, study out your fellow breeders' cage. Make them
roomy enough for six chicks in the nest. Large cages stay clean longer.
Make doors which can be easily opened with one hand, perches should be
easy to install one-handed while your other hand is doing something else,
rolling up papers or whatever. Drawers should slide freely but not too
freely for safety's sake, if you are using drawers (and some breeders do
not use drawers, pinning papers up onto cage fronts to hold them in
place). Construct cages to fit the local newspaper (a real convenience, as
long as that dimension does not change! (Our local Observer
newspaper has, alas, recently shrunk, no longer fitting my cages.)
4. Once a week cut more than enough
papers so you do not have to interrupt your routine to cut paper. Layer
clean papers in the tray even if you pull the drawer daily, useful when
hens or chicks are ripping up the very floors under their feet to line
nests or weaning chicks are making nonstop mess to amuse themselves.
5. Structure your week to save time
and insure quality bird care: Reserve certain days for bird specific
chores:
A.
On
Sunday I change out all drinkers and seed cups of nonfeeding pairs
(feeding pairs get fresh drinkers and egg food dishes every day). Perches
are swapped for clean, though perches should also be changed as needed
since some pairs need fresh perches more often than others.
B.
Monday
is for washing and disinfecting all bird dishes and perches in the dirty
bin. This require many sets of little dishes, which are worth their weight
in sanity since no one should have to wash dishes when he/she does not
feel like it.
C.
On
Tuesday a week's supply of papers are cut for all cages. This is a
huge time saver. Though I have purchased an expensive paper cutter, I have
learned it saves time (and is almost as neat as the cutter) to ignore the
paper cutter and rip away. I line up the margins and tear straight down
freehand.
D.
On
Wednesday perches are changed again as needed and a fresh batch of
eggfood is frozen in one-cup freezer bags if stores are low. Carrots are
cooked in the microwave.
E.
On
Thursday one cage is selected from the lineup to be cleaned, top to
bottom. To make this practical and less traumatic, the designated pair is
transferred into an identical cage to get on with their lives while I
clean. The empty fresh cage goes up on the shelf for the next Thursday
switcheroo. This rotation keeps every cage relatively clean and prevents a
burdensome pileup at the end of the season of very grimy cages.
F.
Friday:
Eggs are candled, troublesome pairs are evaluated, reconfigured or
retired to the flight, new nests taped up for future use. Plastic bands
are placed onto any weaning babies. I take time to listen to young
'squeaker males' in the flight, their band numbers noted. The big flight,
pretty much empty, is cleaned as needed.
G.
Saturday (my day off):
grocery shopping for birds at the market where I am working. No other
chores this day.
The above methods do, of course,
only cover the morning routine. I still make three other routine checks of
every cage during the day during which I repeat the litany, 'seed, water,
greens…more nesting material?' (Do they each have what they personally
need to be successful.) Later in the day they are offered carrot slices,
perhaps more greens, and, of course, more eggfood to feeding pairs.
Banding is always accomplished the last hour of the day when chicks are so
stuffed with food they stay lethargic while being banded. This is a good
time to swap out the old soiled nest for a clean one. Banding goes better
when using a 'banding' tray upon which are placed bands, record book with
pen, paper towel, clean nests to replace grimy nests, anything possibly
used in banding so one does not have to go hunting. I try to band more
than one nest at a time.
These suggestions are offered in
the hope that you can streamline your routine, if it is your desire to do
so. Some fanciers prefer to dawdle since they find it relaxing. I
developed the blue plate technique because of my crazy routine during the
market season. I have found that birds are happy to have all their
favorite foods on one little plate, and they are thrilled to find it the
very first thing when they wake up. It is there early, to get the hen off
her nest to feed her chicks. These soft foods are generally gone when I
get home, upon which they get their second little blue plate (if chicks
are in the cage). The rolling cart was my husband's idea, a great
step-saver because of the way my birdroom is arranged. The bottom shelf of
the cart holds supplies. For another style of room a round table might
work better. Anything which saves you steps, will saves you time. The
chief benefit of 'getting done' is that I can then sit in my bird room,
watching (and listening to) the emerging generation, the perfect
illustration of a well-ordered spring.